DEP hits Sunoco with another fine for Mariner East 2 pipeline construction

Susan Phillips tells stories about the consequences of political decisions on people's every day lives. She has worked as a reporter for WHYY since 2004. Susan's coverage of the 2008 Presidential election resulted in a story on the front page of the New York Times. In 2010 she travelled to Haiti to cover the earthquake. That same year she produced an award-winning series on Pennsylvania's natural gas rush called "The Shale Game." She received a 2013 Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Journalism Award for her work covering natural gas drilling in Pennsylvania. She has also won several Edward R. Murrow awards for her work with StateImpact. In 2013/14 she spent a year at MIT as a Knight Science Journalism Fellow. She has also been a Metcalf Fellow, an MBL Logan Science Journalism Fellow and reported from Marrakech on the 2016 climate talks as an International Reporting Project Fellow. A graduate of Columbia School of Journalism, she earned her Bachelor's degree in International Relations from George Washington University.

Emily Cohen / StateImpact PA

Tree clearing for construction of the Mariner East 2 natural gas liquids pipeline at site in Delaware County. DEP has issued more than 50 violations to Sunoco during the past year of construction. The agency recently fined the company for additional drilling mud spills.

The Department of Environmental Protection fined Sunoco/Energy Transfer Partners an additional $355,622 for drilling mud spills during construction of the Mariner East 2 pipeline.

The multiple violations along the 350-mile long line occurred between May 3, 2017 and February 27, 2018. The fine is on top of the $12.6 million penalty issued by the DEP in February for similar violations of the state’s Clean Streams Law.

“No violations are acceptable,” said DEP Secretary Patrick McDonnell in a statement. “Cleaning up a spill does not excuse Sunoco, or any other company, from complying with the law or paying an appropriate penalty.”

The DEP says Sunoco discharged drilling fluids into wetlands, wild trout streams and High-Quality Waters at locations in Allegheny, Blair, Cambria, Cumberland, Dauphin, Huntingdon, Indiana, Lancaster, and Washington counties. The agency ordered the company to halt construction and clean up the spills, as well as to submit proposed changes to construction methods.

DEP has issued Sunoco more than 50 notices of violations for construction of the Mariner East 2 pipeline.